Materazzi effect and the strategic use of anger in competitive interactions

Abstract

We propose that individuals use anger strategically in interactions. We first show that in some environments angering people makes them more effective in competitions, whereas in others, anger makes them less effective. We then show that individuals anticipate these effects and strategically use the option to anger their opponents. In particular, they are more likely to anger their opponents when anger negatively affects the opponents' performances. This finding suggests people understand the effects of emotions on behavior and exploit them to their advantage.

What in the Word! The Scope for the Effect of Word Choice on Economic Behavior

“…As this example shows, some words have a propensity to activate an impulsive rather than a deliberative mindset, and that, in some settings, such as competitive interactions, this property is deliberately leveraged. Gneezy and Imas () have coined the term the ‘Materazzi effect’ to refer to situations in which individuals anticipate the effects of emotions such as anger and strategically elicit them so as to gain an advantage over their opponents.…”

The Influence of Emotion Regulation on Decision-Making and Its Neural Correlates

“…)、 有限理性理论 (Simon, 1956(Simon, , 1967)和前景 理论 (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979)的衍变之后，决策研究已从早期极力回避情绪的影响，发展到今天认为 决策过程总有情绪相伴 (Hastie, 2001;Lerner, Li, Valdesolo, & Kassam, 2015;Phelps, Lempert, & Sokol-Hessner, 2014)，强调情绪是决策行为的决定性因素之一 (Lerner et al, 2015;Loewenstein & Lerner, 2003;Phelps et al, 2014)。近 10 多年来，有关情绪与决策的学术论文成倍增长，研究者已提出躯体标记假说 (somatic marker hypothesis; Damasio, Everitt, & Bishop, 1996)、主观预期愉悦理论(subjective expected pleasure theory; Mellers, Schwartz, & Ritov, 1999)、风险即情绪模型(risk-as-feelings perspective; Loewenstein & Lerner, 2003;Loewenstein, Weber, Hsee, & Welch, 2001)、情绪充与决策模型(emotion-imbued choice model; Lerner et al, 2015)等理论来解释情绪在决策中的作用。 然而，情绪不仅可以发挥积极作用促进正确决策(Bechara, Damasio, Damasio, & Lee, 1999;Bechara, Damasio, Tranel, & Damasio, 1997)， 也可能产生消极影响妨碍正确决策 Shiv, Loewenstein, Bechara, Damasio, & Damasio, 2005)。那么，发挥情绪对决策的积极作用且避免其消极 影响，对于正确决策就具有重要意义。实现该目标的重要手段是情绪调节，即个体管理和改变自己或他 人情绪的过程。在该过程中，个体通过一定的策略(认知重评，反应抑制等等)使情绪在生理唤醒、主观体 验、表情行为等方面发生一定的变化 (Gross, 1998)，其目的不一定都是为了体验积极情绪，还可能为了实 现其他目的而采取工具性的调节 (Gneezy & Imas, 2014;Tamir, 2009;Tamir, Bigman, Rhodes, Salerno, & Schreier, 2015)。 综观当前研究，决策大致可以分为三类，即风险决策、社会决策和跨期决策 (Lerner et al, 2015;Phelps et al, 2014)。影响决策的情绪大致分为两类 (Lerner et al, 2015;Phelps et al, 2014) …”

Gender, Emotions, and Tournament Performance in the Laboratory

“…To the best of my knowledge, Gneezy and Imas (2014) [22] is the only experiment combining emotion and tournament performance. The authors find that with a strength-based task, anger improves performance.…”